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Nonresident Alien Procedure

3-50-425 Nonresident Alien Procedures

The CWU Payroll Office has responsibility to establish procedures that assist all University centers, departments, and employees in complying with applicable laws and regulations to correctly identify nonresident aliens and accurately withhold the correct amount of tax when making payments directly to University employees, independent contractors, guest speakers, recipients, or students or on their behalf. Payroll Office staff will be trained as nonresident alien tax specialist and will provide training and assistance as needed.

In the spring of 2006, Central Washington University contracted with Arctic International LLC. to create written detailed procedures and documents to cover the complex area of nonresident alien tax law. Due to the copyright agreement with Arctic, the procedures manual produced with the Payroll Department is prohibited from being posted on the University´s external website. However, an electronic copy or a hard copy of the detailed procedures manual may be obtained from the CWU Payroll Office for internal University use.

Any time the University makes a payment or provides a benefit to an individual or company that may be identified as a nonresident alien, the University must take due diligence by obtaining sufficient information to properly identify the tax status and correctly withhold tax as directed by federal law. Non-compliance could result in significant payment and penalties being assessed to the University and charged to departments.

The University utilizes Arctic´s GLACIER software to accurately produce tax status reports for nonresident aliens. A person anywhere in the world with an internet connection can utilize this software once that person has received a password and instructions from the Payroll Office and then selects a User ID upon access.

Any questions should be directed to one of the nonresident alien tax specialists in the Payroll Office. Again, an electronic copy or a hard copy of the detailed procedures manual may be obtained from the CWU Payroll Office for internal University use.